Creating Abby for the Cover. Using a photo generator, with a detailed description of Abigail, working side by side with my wife, we were able to create a real living photograph of Abigail that would become the blueprint for the oil painting on the cover. It took almost 100 attempts until I was satisfied with the image, at which point I handed it over to wife, to begin work using a photoshop program in creating the painting. This image had to be very different from the others, because if you look really closely at the first five book covers, you will see all of the pictures are signed ‘Harriot B.’
For this final book cover, I wanted to recreate the painting in Curio’s Summer, from the day Chole moved into the house, and Birch sees the painting of Abigail done by Chloe for the first time. In order to achieve this, the painting style had to be different, so once we had what was the photo quality image, we set about using filters and some added enhancements to the image to style the image, and make it look like it had been painted. Abby’s fringe lacked red streaks under her hair, so my wife over a day, added them in line by line, to create the layers in such a way that the viewer would see, if Abby flicked her head, the red under fringe would be revealed.
It took a while, and to begin, with, my wife created a first ‘Under Image’ (Attached) on which other layers could be added, and some final detailing. To most people, you will simply see a book cover, but for us, it took a huge amount of time and effort to get the image to perfectly fit what was my idea of Abby in my head, as I wrote the series. I cannot thank my wife enough for her dedication and commitment to myself and my work, as she has worked some very long hours on all of the images that adorn the covers of my book. Each and every one, to me is a masterpiece of her art skill, but I cannot deny, this cover has become my favourite Curio cover image.
The picture on the final cover, unlike all the others in the series is signed ‘Chloe P’ and so now as you read Curio’s Summer, you too will know exactly why Birch loved this picture so much, that she bought immediately from Chole. This base image was in a sense a starting point for the final image, but I cannot deny, I love it equally as much as the finished cover.
Cover Illustration ‘Abigail’ by Rin Zara Morgan. 2025.
